


Smooth like jazz.

by RussianSunflower3



Series: Seijou 4 Week; Sunflower style [1]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Day 1, First Meetings, Gen, Seijou 4 Week
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-20
Updated: 2016-07-20
Packaged: 2018-07-25 13:09:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,903
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7533970
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RussianSunflower3/pseuds/RussianSunflower3
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Matsukawa was a lonely, sensible child with a preference for being alone.</p><p>Hanamaki was a ball of mischief that was moved into his class in elementary.</p><p>Oikawa was confident enough to approach them out of nowhere in High school.</p><p>And Iwaizumi just wants to eat in peace.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Smooth like jazz.

Matsukawa is six years old and in his second year of primary school. He’s a quiet child, who prefers to sit alone and barely interacts with the other children in his class. The teachers try to get him to participate, concerned that he’s asocial and will never make a friend. The truth is, Matsukawa just doesn’t _want_ to talk or play with these children. He’s mature for his age, and watching one of his classmates chew on the wheel of a police car toy just reinforces his belief that they’re _stupid._ He’s not going to exhaust himself trying to get along with stupid people.

“We’re doing a special craft project today, so I want everyone to pair up!” The teacher beams her bright smile before sending a pointed look towards Matsukawa. He may be only six, but he rolls his eyes and turns back to drawing in a little notebook he insists on carrying around with him. He’s not a good artist, but it makes him look busy and fades away into the back of the classroom. It works this time too. Everybody else is partnered up, and Matsukawa is left alone. He smirks at the teacher when she looks his way and sighs.

“Matsukawa, could you join a group of three please?” He frowns deeply, eyebrows furrowing.

“I want to work alone.” The teacher is about to say something in response when there’s a knock on the classroom door and it slides open. Another teacher is there, and at his feet, a child about the same height as Matsukawa with _pink_ hair. It perks his interest, just because it’s so different. The kid wears a grin fitting of someone who just caused major mischief, and if the explosion of glitter covering his clothes means anything, the grin fits him well.

“Sorry to interrupt your class, Hinao-sensei. Do you have room for one more? Hanamaki here isn’t quite... _Focused_ enough for our lesson.”

“As I matter of fact, I do! Hanamaki, would you like to come over here with Matsukawa?” Restraining the urge to groan, Matsukawa sits rigidly still as the boy is led over to his table. The chair is pulled out for him and he sits down, casually folding one leg over the other. When he beams a smile at Matsukawa, he’s missing one of his front teeth.

“Hi, I’m Hanamaki!”

“... Matsukawa. And I don’t like working with other people.” Most six year olds would start to cry, or tell the teacher. Hanamaki, on the other hand, just shrugs.

“Me too. So we’ll work alone, together. Then we don’t get told off but we get what we want.”

“That’s kinda dumb, but if it works...”

“Course it’ll work! I do it with the stupid kids all the time.” Neither of them is listening to the teacher, but she’s writing instructions on the board, so it’ll be easy for them to catch up. Matsukawa is actually enjoying the presence of another for once. Hanamaki doesn’t chew toy cars. Hanamaki doesn’t whinge and cry. Hanamaki reminds him of himself, just a little. 

They go quiet as they read the board. Most of the other children have started already, but Matsukawa knows he can catch up quickly enough. The task is to create a collage of fire safety, and it _must_ contain a fire engine, a hose with water, and a fire extinguisher. Matsukawa is just drawing out the body of the fire engine when he hears Hanamaki snickering. Looking over at Hanamaki’s side of the A3 paper, he sees... A saxophone? Admittedly, it’s extremely good, but that doesn’t erase the confusion.

“... Why are you drawing that?”

“Hinao-sensei used kanji instead of hiragana, right?” 

“Yeah, I can see that.”

“Fire extinguisher and musical instrument are the same in kanji.” Matsukawa snorts with laughter and concentrates as he draws a small piano in the corner of his side.

“There. Now there can be _proper_ music, when they play together.”

“Do you actually play piano?”

“Yeah, my grandma makes me. For ‘dexterity’, she says. I don’t even know what that is. What about you?”

“I play the saxophone! Just ‘cause it’s really cool.” For the first time in a while, Matsukawa finds himself smiling in class. But it’s not smiling at someone else’s misfortune. It’s smiling _for_ someone. Hanamaki grins back, and he thinks he’s found his first friend.

The problem is that most first friends don’t remain friends for long. Matsukawa, however, has always been a little bit different and an exception to most unwritten laws of socialisation. Hanamaki, on the other hand, chooses to actively ignore them. He’s openly rude to people when he wants to be, refuses to do tasks that aren’t fun or messy, and sticks to Matsukawa like glue. They’re steadfast friends, even picking out the same middle school together, and eventually, high school. They start playing a variety of sports together, but their favourites are tennis, volleyball, and basketball.

Up until this point, they’ve always been two. 1 + 1. Matsukawa and Hanamaki. It can’t stay that way forever, people say. And they’re right. But it probably changes in the opposite way to what those people thought. Instead of their friendship breaking apart, it gets stronger and another person naturally gravitates towards them.

His name is Oikawa Tooru, and apparently, he’s a bit of a volleyball obsessed freak. (They don’t even know the half of it yet.) On the first day, they had walked onto the grassy picnic area to eat their lunches, and heard a sharp, awestruck gasp from behind them. They’re met with the vision of a brunet, brown eyes sparkling as he looks at them with a squeal on his lips, bouncing on his heels in excitement. Obviously, they know immediately that it’s Oikawa. He’s sort of a living legend, a name and face seen repeatedly in magazines for middle school volleyball prelims. Matsukawa and Hanamaki share a dubious look.

“Uh... Can we help you?”

“Are you in a club yet~?!”

“No, but we-.”

“You’re so tall! You’d be great at volleyball! You should join the club, I’m going along this afternoon! Look, we’d make a great team!”

“Nah, we only play volleyball for fun. We were looking at the music or art club.” Oikawa huffs and crosses his arms with a pout, his unfairly amazing hair flouncing with the movement.

“You do know they’re super lame, right? The music club has never _entered_ competitions, and the art club has lost every single one since the club was founded. The volleyball club, on the other hand...~” Hanamaki looks to Matsukawa and shrugs a little. With a sigh, Matsukawa runs a hand through his hair.

“I guess we can come check it out. Forms don’t have to be in until the end of week, right?” Oikawa squeals, an inhumane noise, before dancing off without an answer. He skips over to a table on the other side of the court where a boy with black, spiky hair has turned up. The two seem to know each other, and Matsukawa actually feels a pang of pity for the stranger when he stares at Oikawa with an exasperated expression.

“You know... We don’t exactly have a table to sit at yet...”

“What? Matsukawa Issei, are we suggesting we sit with the most famous first year in Aobajosai?”

“He did just invite us to the club.”

“That’s _business_! That’s like how I keep asking people if I can sketch them, but it doesn’t mean I want to be their friend.”

“Fair enough. But, like, those are the only seats left.” Hanamaki looks around, and much to Matsukawa’s words, all the other tables are taken up by second and third years. Matsukawa wears a smug grin, so Hanamaki elbows him in the ribs in amusement.

“Alright, alright. I guess the worst that can happen is they turn us away.” With that mentality in place, the duo approach in a casual, calm way, that doesn’t reflect how Hanamaki’s heart races because he’s anxious _as fuck_ about turned away and looking like an idiot. Gently, Matsukawa pinches his hip. _“You’ll be okay.”_ It’s a silent language they have. They developed it around the first time Hanamaki had a massive anxiety attack from absolutely nowhere, when a teacher in middle school wanted to frame his art and put it in the hallway for everyone to see.

“Hey, you got room for two more?” Oikawa looks up at them with a surprised expression, before he blinks it away and smiles brightly, moving his bag off the bench for Matsukawa to sit down.

“Of course!” The black haired boy pauses in eating what looks like _cold noodles_ to grumble.

“Don’t do it. You’ll regret it. Once Oikawa has you in his clutches, there’s no escape. _Ever_.” Hanamaki sniggers and Matsukawa snorts as Oikawa interjects with a cry.

“Mean, Iwa-chan!” The boy gives a handsome chuckle before holding out a hand to Hanamaki, who’s closest. He looks at the hand for a second and then shakes back with a firm grip.

“Iwaizumi Hajime. Nice to meet you.”

“Hanamaki Takehiro. Nice to meet you too.”

“Why are you being so polite? What, are we meant to be functioning adults?” At Oikawa’s deadpan statement, Matsukawa can’t resist a laugh.

“We’re not even functioning _teenagers_. Anyways, I’m Matsukawa Issei.”

“Everybody knows me~! The kind and fabulous Oikawa Tooru!”

“But you can call him ‘dumbass’ because it fits better.” With a blank, offended stare, Oikawa freezes in place with his eyes on Iwaizumi, who doesn’t even respond. Just eats his cold noodles. Hanamaki instantly decides he likes this person, and mentally marks him down as a prospective friend. Oikawa seems to get over his shock, waving his hands in a strange dolphin like movement before folding them on the table and resting his chin on them.

“So did you guys meet just today?”

“No, we’ve been friends since Hanamaki was dragged into my class, uh, seven? Eight years ago?”

“Eight years.”

“Yeah, that long.” Oikawa nods in recognition of their long standing friendship, looking thoroughly impressed.

“Then we’re two sets of childhood friends!” Matsukawa and Hanamaki look to each other quickly with matching expressions of disbelief, yet tinged with excitement.

“You guys are childhood friends too?”

“Yes! It was a beautiful sunny day, the birds were singing, the breeze was gentle and-”

“Oikawa chased a dragonfly into a brick wall and I had to drag his crying ass back to his mother.” Hanamaki bursts out in beautiful laughter as Matsukawa cackles into his sleeve. Oikawa fakes a sob and whinges about how mean Iwaizumi is, whilst Iwaizumi himself grins with self-satisfaction.

It’s the first time they’ve met as a group of four, but it feels so... Right. Like all _four_ of them have been friends since they were six/seven, instead of two pairs of two. For the rest of Aobajosai, they only grow stronger and closer, until going to university is more like changing to a long-distance relationship. They make it work, and when it comes to _work_ , they find their places near each other.

Granted, their first meetings weren’t spectacular or magnificent – not that many first meetings are – but it suited them to the ground. Something natural, that just happened. Matsukawa is pretty sure that if they hadn’t met that way in that place, they would have still found a way towards each other.  
Together and forever, they were four best friends.


End file.
